


one for the road

by jaehwandred



Category: K-pop, VIXX
Genre: Angst, M/M, author tries too hard to be 3dgy, definitely unhealthy relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-25
Updated: 2016-08-25
Packaged: 2018-08-11 01:39:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7870516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaehwandred/pseuds/jaehwandred
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sanghyuk falls in love with a new addiction. The problem was that this might be the one that killed him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	one for the road

The summer air sizzled on top of black asphalt and cracked earth. When the heat settled upon the earth like a blanket too heavy to throw off, Sanghyuk took to the streets. When his worn sneakers scuffed the concrete and the only ones awake were the ones that were up to no good, it was a summer well spent.

There was a Sanghyuk without the award winning smiles and the president of his High School’s Academic Decathlon team smile. And there was a Sanghyuk that threw caution to the wind, scattering it behind him out the window of his trusty Ford Mustang, ironically a gift for his satisfactory performance that was sealed away in resumes and letters of recommendation. He had an unfortunate side affair with skid marks and exhaust fumes and the thrill of a dare.

This was the Sanghyuk that saw to it that while the town slept, the streets were still very much alive.

In the other lane, another car pulled up beside the Mustang. The quiet thrum of the engine was starting to feel more like a snarl, wound up energy ready to sprint forward once the reins were loosed. The BMW M3 next to him was a cheery sky blue, too optimistic to be taken seriously, despite the sleek curves of new money. The tinted windows rolled down to reveal a sharp smile, the kind that screamed challenge, and eyes that looked just that side of too youthful. The bass thumped out a war cry on million dollar speakers and the other driver gave a lazy two-fingered salute.

Sanghyuk’s heart surged under the red traffic light of anticipation.

“See you on the streets,” a quiet taunt but Sanghyuk still caught every word. The window retreated, encasing each other in their own worlds again. Jaehwan was like that, colliding into people’s lives to bring them trouble and going back to self inflected isolationism again.

He also toppled Sanghyuk’s crown won from being the king of street racing and disappeared from the town, taking Sanghyuk’s pride with him. That wasn’t taking into account the snide remarks fired rapidly at Sanghyuk and his friends in the hallway like Jaehwan was always ready for a fight and to make matters worse, he had a seemingly unlimited supply of ammunition. He still wasn’t entirely sure if he had quite forgiven that.

The four lane interstate yawned before them, a private track, looking for trouble. Everything looked different at night. And begging for a race.

Time stood in the space between color changes.

He took his foot off the clutch. A silent transcript between driver and car. Easy, easy. It sprung to life underneath him, raring for a fight. This was the Sanghyuk who had no respect for life and yet cherished every burning atom inside of him.

Red. Yellow. Green.

He gave the Mustang its head and it charged forward with abandon, his back pressed against slick leather, disappearing into the streetlight-dappled night. It was only on nights like these that the car felt dangerous, felt too fast for his body to handle, to keep in check. He galloped down the track, in the rear view mirror, Jaehwan looked like he was cruising, merely content to follow in his wake.

Down the stretch, the other car pulled ahead, the lights flickered and flared, this was the life energy of the night.

 

Caught in between gears was mindlessness. The kind of buzz that Sanghyuk sought in anything and everything, with the lapse of street beneath him. The wide nose of the Mustang charged forward, lengthening its stride.

Two lengths ahead. A car ahead. This was victory in sight, the taste of a glorious cheer in his mouth. Until it wasn’t.

A window rolled down, a middle finger in the air. This wasn’t the outmaneuvering of two racers. This was the newness and impossibility of a new pair of shiny wheels that exploded past him into the unending night before him, the night that was a couple shades darker than the one lit by gentle village nights and the kind of night that befell the empty fields beyond.

It left in a cloud of electricity and charged air, and the briefness of their meeting was over like that. He was left with the disappointed jangle of keys and the tired sigh of his weary car.

The night felt so unfinished, like it was waiting for something, just a little more.

At least it was a nice ‘Welcome Home’.

—

The Sanghyuk of the day spent less time off the streets and more time in the library where the air conditioning was free or on the porches of general stores preserved by time and goodwill, the kind that could only be found in this quaint corner of Middle of Nowhere. It was the kind of store with shelves of home-made jams and bins of salt water taffy and his favorite soda pops in pristine form, barely chilled in struggling refridgerators.

The cool fizz of orange soda in the shade sang summer with the soft rustle of yellowing grass and the lazy breeze.

A car slid to a stop in the four car parking lot, a sky blue BMW under the bright sky. Sanghyuk’s gaze was drawn to it like a particularly strong magnet. Out stepped Jaehwan, pulled from a dream. When his nights were kept so separately from his days, it was hard to reconcile the reality sometimes. He looked softer in the day, somehow, maybe it was the ridiculous sunglasses, but his smile was as sharp as ever. He wasn’t sure if the jolt in his stomach was from a knee-jerk reaction of annoyance at his general presence or something else entirely.

“Fancy meeting you here,” he said, his voice rolling with confidence. “If I were sorry, I’d apologize for beating you last night but no hard feelings, right?” He offered his closed fist and Sanghyuk almost reluctantly bumped back with his own.

“Wouldn’t have the energy to hold a grudge over something that petty. Besides, we don’t even know each other.” Sanghyuk said, brushing the words off his shoulder.

“You? Not petty or the type to hold grudges?” Jaehwan barked out a laugh, staring at him like he was unsure if he was being duped. “Not the same Sanghyuk I remember from my teenage years.”

Jaehwan. Everything about him seemed so out of place. Where everything was a picture frozen in time, a vignette rose tinted with nostalgia and childhood, he belonged to an era of sleek cars and supercomputers. His brand names belonged with the big city and skyscrapers, not here in a sleepy town that woke up at eleven and was preparing for another nap at three.

“You’re not the same Jaehwan I remember either. You went from poster child for delinquent poverty child to,” He gestured vaguely, “Whatever the fuck this is supposed to be.”

Jaehwan made a noise somewhere halfway between a scoff and a laugh. “Funny. Things change when you get rich,” he said, “It’s just that it’s hard to reconcile you with the person that I met yesterday.”

“I’m not the one who changed. You only knew one part of me.” Sanghyuk had spent more time kindling a dead end rivalry with the only person who could best him on the streets than actually doing any of his homework. In retrospect, his long term study skills definitely suffered from the fact that he could buy his way through school. The days where he was always ready to greet Jaehwan with a jeer and a loose smile only to be wounded by a witty rejoinder seemed like a lifetime ago.

“I suppose not,” Jaehwan said with a shrug but his tone of voice suggested that he really wasn’t interested in the past or present Sanghyuk, “But you still look like you spend your afternoons dog walking or volunteering to help kids or something, not challenging strangers to illegal drag races.”

Sanghyuk took another sip of his quickly warming orange soda. “And you look like you spend your afternoons coding programs and fixing computers in big important places like New York or Los Angeles, not wasting a perfectly good summer somewhere like this.”

Jaehwan gestured vaguely to his outfit, to his car. “This is all for show, unfortunately. That sounds like a much better life than the one I’m living. Although, I admit that the job comes with its perks. I do enjoy traveling, no matter where the journey takes me.”

“You look like you’re fresh out of college, what kind of job would lead you out here?”

He smiled to himself, a secret smile paired with a wry expression. “I’m not sure if I can be doing anything for a living when I’m more than halfway to my grave already. Kidding. Sort of. Either way, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

“Try me.”

“I’m a hitman.”

“Well, you can’t expect me to take you very seriously when you say it that easily, can you?”

Most of his lost street races ended in rivalries and burnt curses shouted into the night, not sitting his once-opponent on the hood of his car with more orange soda and an abundance of old-time candy.

Somewhere in between explaining that he was here for the summer, on break from his college classes at his Ivy League of choice, Sanghyuk had decided that in his own way, Jaehwan was attractive in a way that he rarely found. It wasn’t that he held no interest in guys, it was just that most of his romantic endeavors ended in street alleys or whiskey fueled one night stands. It had been awhile since he had seen someone he thought attractive in lighting other than strobe lights or the haze of smoke.

He was a mix of soft eyes and a sharp smile with a 100 MPH voice, a charismatic mix of wit and charm.

“…and he had the audacity to try to change the music while we were fucking. In my car. I believe that I’m still recovering from just how offended I was that night. Are you still listening to me?” He asked, but there was more amusement in his voice than annoyance, to Sanghyuk’s relief.

“Huh? Sorry,” Sanghyuk blinked rapidly, “I just got distracted.”

“Distracted,” Jaehwan drawled, “Am I not interesting enough for you? Or are you just staring blankly into nature because your phone playlist switched into soft Indie Acoustic?”

“It’s relaxing!” Sanghyuk said defensively while Jaehwan laughed at him but he had a way of making it seem like he was always laughing with him, like he was making himself the butt of the joke. “And do you owe all of these 100% believable instances to the fact that you’re a hitman?”

“I do,” he said almost solemnly, “It’s how I keep my social skills sharp.”

“You do seem like quite the heart-breaker,” Sanghyuk said.

“Not on purpose, though.” Jaehwan said unconvincingly but feigning offense when Sanghyuk shot him a look. “Cross my heart! I’m just not one to move past the whole friendship thing into the whole romance thing.”

“Look at you. Fulfilling the bad boy with no heart archetype.” Sanghyuk deadpanned.

This time, Jaehwan’s laughter was definitely self deprecating, a somehow ironic self awareness. “No, I have a heart. I’m not scared of love, or anything. I’m just…how should I put this?” His fingers thrummed absent-mindedly on the metal of the car. “I’m not looking for it. My life is led by coincidence, I guess you could say. I’m not sure if I even believe that anymore, though, or if it’s just a convenient way for me to opt out of trying too hard in life when I can just trust the luck of the day instead.”

“Doesn’t sound like a very smart or even reasonable way to live.”

“Well. I’m not sure how to break this to you, Sanghyuk, but I’m not a very smart or very reasonable person.”

—

Coincidence only goes so far until it stops feeling like the hand of fate and more like mankind’s meddling.

The junkyard glittered with relics of broken bottles and rusted cars, lying on top of a graveyard of rubber tires and sparse grass. Ten years ago it was a playground of sunken pirate ships and castles fit for a king. Then it turned into an after school sanctuary, hidden away in smoke, contraband, and lines of coke. Sanghyuk wasn’t sure what it was now. A memory of a life he lived before he ran away to chase his future. Or perhaps it was a new blank canvas, waiting for an undefinable something more, the something more that artists spent their waking days trying to capture and the something more that inspired youth to chase it halfway across the world.

Wonsik was with him and so was Hakyeon. Unlike him, they never left. Wonsik was content with running his father’s car repair shop and burning through the streets at night. His job gave him something steady to do with his hands all day, kept him practical and level-headed. He knew his cars like no one else did, he knew what every rumble of the engine meant beneath him, trusted in exact numbers and calculating cunning, completely unlike Sanghyuk’s misguided trust in sheer dumb luck and an adrenaline high.

Hakyeon stayed, only because he could afford to. The world could wait for Hakyeon because old money lined his pockets, passed down from his father and his father’s father. Colleges would accept him with open arms and on his terms. If he wanted a break from years of education, he was free to stay in a town where most of its life was condensed in one street and he lived a life of blissful monotony. For now, at least.

It struck him then, how strange it was that when he came back, everything fell right into place, friendships and inside jokes slotted into their original places like he never left. It should have been boring, anti-climatic even. But with them, time spent was like a sigh of relief, an exhale of breath when Sanghyuk hadn’t even realized that he had stopped breathing in the first place.

He took a swig of whiskey straight from the bottle, the alcohol burning down his throat and settling in his chest with a heavy warmth, when their makeshift sanctuary was disturbed.

“You know we shoot all trespassers on sight, right?” Sanghyuk called out. Beside him, Hakyeon immediately jumped to his feet, the smoldering remains of his cigarette dropped onto the rusty hood of a car.

“Tell your guard dog to heel,” Jaehwan said, emerging from behind a column of discarded desks, with his hands up and a nod at Hakyeon whose face curled with disgust.

“Why are you here?” Hakyeon cut in.

“Chill out, Hakyeon,” Wonsik said lazily, his body half draped on an old bench, “We’re all adults now and Jaehwan hasn’t even bothered us in years.”

“Where have you been anyways?” Hakyeon asked with a suspicious leer.

“Away,” replied Jaehwan.

Sanghyuk rolled his eyes and offered him a cigarette out of common courtesy. Jaehwan accepted.

“You never answered Hakyeon’s question though. Why are you here?” He asked, reclining against a windshield Sanghyuk was relatively certain would hold his weight. Jaehwan climbed on top of the car’s hood to join him. He pretended not to notice that he could feel the inconspicuous brush of Jaehwan’s bare arm as he leaned over, pressing his body lightly into him to help himself to the bottle of whiskey left unattended. His skin prickled under the touch even through their layers of clothing. His mind told him, quite rationally, that any animosity between them was derived from the sheer fact that Sanghyuk could not swallow his pride when beaten; he was a sore loser. In retrospect, he wasn’t entirely sure if that was the only reason he spent so much of his time antagonizing Jaehwan and vice versa. In the present day, he was completely sure that he was not the only one who realized that. “Come to pick a fight?”

“That was your thing, not mine,” Jaehwan said smugly, “I was always the good one, you were the one always looking for trouble. And I only came here looking for the town’s golden boys. Would it be really so hard to believe if I said I just wanted to talk?”

Yes, because conversations with Jaehwan had always been historically like playing an extended game of two truths and a lie.

Hakyeon laughed derisively at that. “Not true. You nearly got a kid expelled once out of spite, everyone knows you forged that evidence. Not to mention you blew up your dad’s fucking car on graduation night and that bank robbery on the night before you left was you and your cohorts. Don’t try to deny it. I’m just not even sure how you got away with that.”

Jaehwan cocked his head at him, “A little bit of fun, that’s all. I was younger and stupider back then,” He spread his arms as if welcoming peace instead of more of his hostility. “We’ve all changed. I don’t hate Sanghyuk, Sanghyuk doesn’t hate me. I think. But Sanghyuk isn’t exactly your perfect angel either.” He leaned in conspiratorially. “Your little Sanghyuk gets into a lot more trouble than you realize and I'm sure he'd love to tell you all about it.”

Sanghyuk scowled at the implied intimacy, swatting Jaehwan away, not thinking about how his words lingered in their shared space.

“You keep trying to put the past behind you,” Wonsik said in his low voice, “So it wouldn’t kill you to tell us if all the rumors we heard about you back then were true or not, right?”

Jaehwan shrugged, the movement slow and languid in the heavy heat of a mid summer night, his pretentious button down, artfully unbuttoned, his collar splayed open to reveal the sharp jut of collar bones. Sanghyuk was going to pretend that he didn’t see that or take notice of it, it was easier that way.

“I think I prefer to preserve the memory of high school Jaehwan the way it was, thanks.”

“In love with danger.” Sanghyuk said, turning to Jaehwan.

Something glinted in Jaehwan’s eye as he looked steadily back at him, his smirk unfurling, slow and suggestive. “I don’t deal with love so much as I deal with obsessions. You were the one in love.”

He surveyed Jaehwan and his permanent half smile. He was reminded of how much he hated talking to Jaehwan, he was like a rattlesnake, step wrong, say the wrong word, falter in his unspoken chess match of words and you’d find yourself dead. Dangerous. Danger.

Jaehwan being in the midst of their group just felt like someone throwing a lit match into a pool of gasoline.

“Maybe. For all of our talk, I don’t think that either of us have really changed at all.” Sanghyuk slid off the car with a fluid motion, plucking the already half empty bottle of whiskey from Jaehwan and taking another swig. His favorite part about nights like these were when every idea that filtered through his head started to sound like an adventure, the warmness in his chest urging him on. For all of Hakyeon’s griping and Wonsik’s feigned laziness, he knew they were always with him. He had earned their loyalty long ago. The top three students of their alma mater were just a little more in love with an adrenaline high and the infallibility of youth than a far off future.

“You know, I do think tonight would be a fun night to pay a visit to our old school. Haven’t seen that place in ages,” Sanghyuk said with all the casualty of someone suggesting a jaunt down the park.

They would follow him. Hakyeon’s eyes held that boyish light. Wonsik grinned at him. That didn’t change.

“You know, the fact that you can buy out this town’s police force really discounts the fun in all of it,” Jaehwan griped. He showed no intention of being left out. It was an impulse decision but that was always half the fun. Knowing they could do stupid things for the sake of doing stupid things. They could finish growing up later.

They sped there in Sanghyuk’s Mustang, the angry honks of perturbed drivers following their ride, they replied with immature laughter and immature hand signals out of rolled down windows. They were a group of ragtag jeans and old sweatshirts, lingering with the scent of alcohol. Except for Jaehwan. Sanghyuk vaguely hoped that if they ever bothered to review the grainy security footage, someone would realize that Jaehwan was a pretentious outlier who should not be considered.

Had this been any crime of significant importance, they probably would have caught with their breathless laughters and “Shut ups!” in the darkened hallways, illuminated with their phone flashlights. Much to Wonsik’s annoyance. (“Using the flashlight kills my battery!” “You literally have 85% left.”) If the security were more stringent, they definitely would have been caught somewhere around the time that they passed by the indoor pool, crashing through the locker room, or maybe around the time they fumbled in the dark of a science classroom, inadvertently knocking down a model skeleton.

It was the kind of thrill thrill in the way that could only be achieved by things such as sneaking about in places you shouldn’t be.

“Come on, when will we ever get this opportunity again?” Hakyeon pleaded, staring at the principal’s door. “He brought me in here so many times on the account of ‘suspected cheating.’”

“Hakyeon, you were a notorious cheater. You were like a drug lord but for an illegal homework trading ring.”

“Shut up.” Hakyeon huffed. “I’m still going in.” He pushed past the unlocked door and despite the fact that they were already illegally trespassing, this felt like just one step further. Old principle stopping the former student in them.

In the darkness, the walls full of towering libraries and tacky souvenir gargoyles seemed oddly menacing when cast into sharp relief. Hakyeon paid them no mind and crashed onto the large plush chair behind an oak desk, like a king surveying his domain. He laughed at Wonsik’s and Sanghyuk’s combined judgmental look, looking much younger than he usually acted around them. “It’s comfortable. I’ve always wanted to try it instead of sitting in those certified torture devices,” He said, making a sweeping motion at the hard-backed wooden chairs.

“If it’s that nice, you should just take it,” Jaehwan mused, standing slightly apart from the group.

Sanghyuk only had to see the delighted smile on Hakyeon’s face to see that for once, he thought that Jaehwan had a splendid idea.

“I can’t fucking believe—“ Sanghyuk began. They had somehow managed to get the chair out of the school successfully (the doorways were managed with a lot of cursing, mostly on Jaehwan’s part even though all he did was complain that their progress was too slow while not putting his scrawny body to very good use) and when faced with the prospect of dragging the chair back to the junkyard, Hakyeon had popped into the store next door, bought some heavy duty rope and Sanghyuk still couldn’t believe the night ended up with him having to drive through side alleys and shady detours to drag an office chair behind him. He was relatively certain that was not street legal.

Jaehwan, drunk on the incredibility of the night’s adventures and quite a solid amount of Hakyeon’s hidden stash of vodka, slung his arm casually around Sanghyuk’s shoulder as if they were lifetime friends instead of teenage enemies. “You seem to get away with a lot of things with very little foresight and a whole lot of luck, you know.”

They watched as Wonshik spun Hakyeon around in the chair, glaringly new amidst the piles of old, illuminated by the glow of old lamps and lanterns hooked up to a whirring power generator. He hadn’t realized that he had missed this so much, no matter how far he traveled and no matter how many opportunities life handed him on a silver platter, he wasn’t sure if he’d ever find another home like this. Wistful thinking, perhaps. “It’s my specialty,” Sanghyuk said, and oh, Jaehwan looked so much softer in this night, abuzz with fireflies and the glow of success. “There were so many things that should have gone wrong tonight but didn’t,” He paused. “Maybe you’re my good luck charm.”

Jaehwan spent so much of his time with hidden smiles and covert words that Sanghyuk delighted in the little shocked expression on his face but he quickly recovered, smoothing out into a suggestive smile, always with that hint of a something more. “Ha. That’s too soft for you. Good fuck charm would be more appropriate?”

Sanghyuk rolled his eyes and shoved Jaehwan away. “You ruined it. We almost could have had a moment.”

“It’s my specialty,” Jaehwan shot back.

They lapsed into a short silence, it might have been awkward were it not for the fact that it was three in the morning and they were all coming down, their thoughts headed towards their own beds and respective hangovers that they would have to deal with tomorrow.

“It’s probably somewhat past my bed time now,” Jaehwan said airily, “And I get the feeling that you’re about to fall asleep standing up.”

Sanghyuk blinked the sleep out of his eyes with determination, shaking his head to clear his mind. “You’re right, I guess we should all be headed back soon. I’ll…” There was a pregnant pause. “See you later then.” It didn’t end in a question.

This time Jaehwan’s surprise was just that much more calculated with just the right amount of charming and conniving. “How do you know?”

—

The weight of the cool metal felt like a disaster waiting to happen in the wrong hands. The gun had been stolen from his father’s cabinet and he doubted that he would ever notice. If he did, Sanghyuk, proper straight A student Sanghyuk, would never be the suspect.

He jumped when he heard footsteps too loud to be anything but deliberate. It was Jaehwan, striding into plain view because he had no need to walk like normal people, strutting was a more efficient form of movement. “New toy?” He asked, and Sanghyuk scowled at the familiar jeer in his voice.

“Watch it, I’m a decent shot.” He said warningly, using one hand to point a finger gun at him, feigning shots.

Jaehwan, surprisingly, laughed at that. In the sunlight of the bright morning, he was less of a threat and more of a playful enigma. It suited him. His smile looked like it was out of practice. “Prove it then,” he said, walking over to where Sanghyuk stood, his scuffed sneakers pressing down on the yellowing grass. It was unnecessary, their close contact as he assessed the pistol that he held, turning it over in his hands, his nimble fingers quickly switching the safety off. “Since the temptation to shoot me is probably there, I would like to inform you that I would be extremely upset if I ended up dead. Thought I would let you know.”

“Duly noted,” Sanghyuk said smartly and he was aware of his heavy gaze as he turned around, eyeing the line of glass bottles in front of him.

The first shattered handsomely under his bullet but Jaehwan made a little noise at the back of his throat, like he had criticism or a tidbit to offer. This was maddening, Jaehwan’s eyes focused on his every move, to how he saw his shot, to his technique, probably even his stance. He was being analyzed and it was difficult to ignore. He ignored it, lining up another shot but it missed, impaling itself into the side of the fading yellow school bus behind the bottles instead.

“You’re distracting me!” Sanghyuk snapped at Jaehwan, partially out of the fact that there was no one else around to take the blame.

Jaehwan feigned shock at that, looking convincingly like a kicked puppy. Sanghyuk knew better. “It’s not my problem you can’t focus under pressure!” He retaliated, “Here, let me show you something.”

Sanghyuk stood warily as Jaehwan stalked over to him, standing behind him, his touch deceptively gentle as he positioned Sanghyuk’s arms, resting his chin on his shoulder as he squinted slightly, assessing the remaining bottles. Well. He was infinitely more distracting this way, that was for sure.

“You have no creativity,” Jaehwan chided, “This place is a playground. Use your environment.”

“Frankly, I’m more of a ‘If the bullet hits the target, it’s a success’ type of guy. I don’t know what you’re doing with your free time,” Sanghyuk remarked.

He didn’t hear so much as he felt Jaehwan’s sigh against his body but he turned Sanghyuk’s body, lining up the shot for him, aiming the gun at a rusty wheel rim. “Ready, aim…”

Sanghyuk fired, the bullet, bouncing off the surface with a satisfying ‘Ding!’ and shattering the bottle. He felt almost uneasy, no, just on the edge, with the thrill of having this power in his hands, to feel the pulse of his weapon, ready to do his bidding with precision. He made a small noise of surprise at the success, turning to face Jaehwan, well aware of the lack of proximity between them.

“I think I might be one step closer to believing your hitman story now,” He said.

Jaehwan laughed, a little bit breathless, a very not-Jaehwan thing to sound like. But he didn’t look away, his eyes meeting Sanghyuk’s levelly, leaning lightly in until Sanghyuk could feel his soft exhale. This close, he smelled like mint and expensive cologne, prim and proper, everything that he had never been. “Thought you stayed away from danger.”

“I’m evidently a really shitty liar,” Sanghyuk said and he leaned in with a fistful of Jaehwan’s button down, and kissed him. It felt a bit like taking the safety off of his gun and loading his veins with exhilaration. In return, he got the Jaehwan that he expected, the one that determinedly tangled himself with him, a thrill ride with more than a hint of teeth tugging at his lower lip, the one that treated everything like a war to be won.

“And I have found myself in the bad habit of telling the truth an awful lot nowadays,” Jaehwan murmured against the curve of his lips, “I'll try my hardest to not be utterly predictable and cliche and fall in love with you.”

Truth.

That wouldn’t happen, Sanghyuk wouldn’t let it, because he was a sensible person now, to realize that Jaehwan wanted obsessions, possessions and Sanghyuk would not become either of those.

But Jaehwan tasted an awful lot like an addiction waiting to be found.

Truth.

Kissing Jaehwan felt a lot like hating him.

Lie.

—

Hakyeon would be pissed at him for this later, Sanghyuk thought dimly as Jaehwan shoved him behind the bar, in a dark alley that screamed shitty murder mystery waiting to happen, and wasted no time in pinning him to the nearest wall, his back hitting the bricks there with a dull thud. He growled low in his throat, trying to push Jaehwan off of him but he pinned his wrists to the wall above him. In the night, he looked more like the Jaehwan that he had known of his youth, a taunt in his mouth and the sharp glint of the night in his eyes.

Jaehwan didn’t kiss him.

He bit at the exposed skin of his neck, dragging his tongue down, his lips skating across his collar bones. “Mine,” Jaehwan hissed against his fever skin.

“I’m not yours,” Sanghyuk retorted with a hint of annoyance in his voice.

Jaehwan swallowed it down with his lips, his knee pressing in between Sanghyuk’s thigh. “Should have thought of that before you agreed to this.”

Sanghyuk wasn’t sure what this was but this was not how it started last week in an easy morning in his broken down sanctuary. He couldn’t bring himself to regret it just yet.

—

“Holy shit Sanghyuk, you look like you haven’t slept in at least three years,” Hakyeon said, his hand through his hair comforting as he leaned instinctively into it.

“Jaehwan,” He muttered vaguely.

Hakyeon frowned.

“Seems like he’s doing you more harm than good.”

“Per usual,” Sanghyuk said, meaning it in good humor.

“Why don’t you stop?” Hakyeon did not see things the same way, evidently.

He didn’t have a reason as to why the works stuck in his mouth like toffee on a warm day.

“I…can’t.” He said finally.

—

They went for a ride down empty streets, the Mustang charging through old haunting grounds. He was starting to find that Jaehwan didn’t like the quiet much and would talk to fill it, regaling him with stories of old memories as they passed by one convenience store or another, the house of an old friend.

The clock on Sanghyuk’s dashboard read 2:38 AM when he pulled to a stop in the dead center of a brightly lit tunnel.

That got Jaehwan to stop his absent-minded chattering. “Why here?”

Sanghyuk didn’t know how to tell him that this tunnel was a mosaic of his youth, the destination of late night visits with a bottle of spray paint, either by himself or with his friends. The bright letters and art spanned the entire wall of the tunnel. It had started with a blank canvas freshman year. It was the unconventional tapestry of his life. He was here, he existed, he mattered.

He finally settled for, “Up to no good again, I suppose.”

The car doors shut behind them and Sanghyuk watched as Jaehwan’s eyes took in the sight of the wall before him. It wasn’t perfect, it was a motley collection of street art and inside jokes. His fingers skimmed the colorful walls as if he was trying to recall memories that he was never a part of.

Sanghyuk couldn’t explain why he brought him here, to bear himself to Jaehwan, who didn’t want anything more than his companionship, to fall into his bed at the end of a long day but Jaehwan was treating the wall with reverence. It was an unexpected act of tenderness that made his heart ache in the strangest way.

They found old bottles of spray paint in the back of Sanghyuk’s car and they left their mark on the never-ending tapestry. Jaehwan, as expected, was more sophisticated than Sanghyuk’s friends could ever be, overlaying their crude drawings and simple designs with intricacies that made sense only in the jumble of his mind.

They existed in the colored smoke, illuminated by Sanghyuk’s headlights and as Jaehwan waited in the passenger seat, he couldn’t help but turn around and take in what had been done.

Jaehwan’s contribution lent a cohesive theme to the mess of works left before him. What he added faded into normalcy the longer one looked at it, seemingly becoming a part of the piece from before it was even conceived.

Sanghyuk drove away with a quiet heaviness in his chest that thumped a little at the sight of Jaehwan curled up in the seat next to him, his hair a mess and his breath fogging the window, fast asleep. He didn’t want to regret this mistake.

—

“Why didn’t you kiss me?”

Jaehwan sat at the edge of the bed, the muscles in his back taut and his head bowed. He looked at once vulnerable and prepared for a battle that wouldn’t come.

The silence of the room weighed heavy on both of them.

He sighed then, a heavy and time worn one and Jaehwan stood up, heading to the bathroom and he closed the door behind him with a decisive click.

“Fucking bastard,” He snapped at no one, scowling at the absurdity of how someone who could take him to the top of the world could throw him back down in one moment. It was infuriating, more specifically, he was infuriating.

The more he got to know Jaehwan, the more he realized that he did not know him at all.

—

They lost their topic of conversation somewhere between the warm scent of pot in the air and the vodka spilled on Jaehwan’s shirt. They rested on the old train tracks outside of town, Sanghyuk’s head propped up by his hands folded like a pillow under his head, his side pressed against Jaehwan, casual intimacy.

“You left so soon after graduation, you never gave me that last race you promised.” Sanghyuk said suddenly.

“Might have had something to do with my brother, you know, dying the day of graduation.” Jaehwan said, the sentence clearly intended to startle Sanghyuk into enough awkwardness to let it slide.

He turned on his side, his eyebrows furrowing. “I didn’t know, I’m sorry—“

“Don’t be. We were never super close anyways, I just wanted an excuse to get out of this town at that point, to be honest.”

Translation: He was the world to me. I couldn’t bear to be back.

“And yet you came back here. You’re here now.” Sanghyuk said, his eyes piercing.

Jaehwan closed his eyes.

“It’s for a job. I told you, I’m a hitman. I don’t lie.”

“You’re fluent in lying and deception. You could be considered bilingual if you consider wit and heavy sarcasm a language too.”

Jaehwan laughed, a single note. A short Ha. “I wouldn’t lie about that. My job. I guess I don’t need to because nobody believes me.”

“You haven’t killed anyone since you’ve gotten here.”

Jaehwan considered this. “It’s a difficult target, this time. Unfortunately for me, I don’t fail.”

“Unfortunately?”

“This might be the job that kills me.”

—

It figured that the one day he spent at home, Jaehwan would still find him. This time, it was on the streets on the kind of scorching afternoon with the heat shimmering just above the black asphalt.

His car radio played easy R&B from a Spotify playlist helpfully entitled “Afternoon Chill”, his windows shut with the air conditioning on blast.

The sky blue BMW pulled up beside him. In this particular setting, the sky blue talked of insolence and tackiness. The light turned green. Nobody moved.

He was willing to suffer possible heat stroke for this. He rolled down his passenger side window to get the full blast of Jaehwan’s current collection of shitty electronica from his car’s speakers. “Bet you five dollars and a not half-assed blowjob?” He called.

Jaehwan laughed behind his thousand dollar designer shades and flipped him off. Translation: Yes, but fuck you, that couldn’t even properly be called a blowjob yesterday.

He turned off the air conditioning to buy himself some extra power. In times like these, Jaehwan was half dangerous, half temptation. The light on the opposing street would turn yellow, two seconds to get off the line.

He rolled his windows down, the engine snarled and growled out its frustration. He wasn’t sure if his pulse replaced the engine or if it was vice versa. The smoke from the rear tires curled into the air, lazy tendrils filling the air.

Noses up to the light. This was how he found trouble then and now.

The traffic light above them turned red. Sanghyuk focused his sights ahead. The opposing light was still green. Yellow. Food off the clutch, gearshift knob at the ready.

The light above them turned green.

They burst from the starting gate and he could hear his own laugh of delight, Jaehwan’s insults called in a high boyish voice.

Sanghyuk had learned since his High School days, shift from third to fourth. He darted past Jaehwan, the sky blue car unwilling to let this one go easily was hot on his Mustang’s tail. He charged past the finish line, the next light, half a car ahead, his car horn honking out a victory loud enough to disturb any sleeping residents from their midday nap.

He could see Jaehwan’s grin in his rearview mirror, it looked like how it felt to have his smile pressed against his skin.

He would give the world to keep this sun kissed happiness close to his heart.

—

Jaehwan slid into the diner booth across from Sanghyuk, sinking into the cheap faux leather. It was a morning rare for a summer so idyllic, gray and cool, rain laden clouds blotting out the sun, the deep rumble of thunder echoing through the sky.

Even with their breakfast laid in front of them (An omelette for Sanghyuk and an extravagant setting of French Toast for Jaehwan), something was off. When Sanghyuk realized that Jaehwan wasn’t in the mood for much conversation (“Do you want to do anything today?” “Don’t know, up to you.”), he supposed it was better to pay more attention to his phone and his meal than to acknowledge the awkward silence that fell in between them.

His fork clinked against the white plate. Jaehwan hadn’t given him more than dismissive responses to questions, making absolutely no attempt at conversation. There were times that they had enjoyed each other’s company without saying a word but this was different, charge. Sanghyuk knew they had never been, officially anyways, dating, but he thought they were still friends and he figured it was reasonable to expect some kind of effort if Jaehwan was the one that invited him to breakfast in the first place.

“Did you want me to come here just to watch you sulk and/or brood all morning?” Sanghyuk finally said, breaking the silence.

Jaehwan scowled at him. “I’m not sulking or brooding.”

Sanghyuk stared at him.

Jaehwan went back to only half-brooding, his keychain in his hand, twirling his keys absent-mindedly around his finger. “I’m sorry,” he finally said. “I’m just thinking.”

“Haven’t seen you do that in awhile.”

Jaehwan scowled some more.

“I just…” He sighed, and took to staring out the window instead, where the first drops of rain began to softly pitter patter onto the washed out paint of a cracked parking lot. “I suppose I’m simply upset because I don’t like endings.”

“Endings?” Sanghyuk asked, “Just because summer is ending and we have to go back to the real world soon doesn’t mean whatever this is has to end.”

Jaehwan frowned down at the table, tapping on the wood with his key. “No, that’s not what I meant.”

“What do you mean, then? Or will you just not tell me?”

Jaehwan didn’t regale him with an answer right away, instead, he took his time, carving his name onto the wood. The imprints of this act stood out in sharp relief, a permanent mark of his existence here.

“I don’t like saying goodbye. Especially when things aren’t on my terms.”

If there was one thing that Sanghyuk knew about Jaehwan it was that he was fiercely independent. Burning through life with no help simply to prove that he could do it by himself, that he could chase his livelihood and conquer any problems with sheer determination alone. Jaehwan would rather die on his own terms than live under someone else’s hand.

The way he saw it, Jaehwan wouldn’t be content even to live under the rule of fate.

—

The cicadas sang outside of Sanghyuk’s bedroom window. That wasn’t the right description. More like banded together into a choir sent straight from hell to perform a cacophony of raucous sounds but still, it was the sound of summer and sleepless nights.

He stared up at his uneven ceiling, his blankets half hanging off of his bed, listening to the whir of the ceiling fan making its quick revolutions and the hiss of the sprinklers sputtering on in a stately green summer garden. It was home.

He had resigned himself to an evening of surfing the internet when his phone buzzed just around the same time he could see the headlights of Jaehwan’s sky blue BMW pull up in his driveway. Inconspicuous.

To avoid any allusions to a certain Shakespeare play, he decided to shoot off an angry text, inquiring after his intentions, to Jaehwan rather than lean out his window to herald his midnight visitor below.

[ To: Jaehwan ] What r u doing

[ To: Sanghyuk ] Come down and you’ll see

He wasn’t sure what compelled him to pull on his favorite navy blue hoodie and sneak past his parent’s open door and out into the heavy summer air but it felt all too much like his High School days and even though his parents couldn’t exactly ground him or take away his phone now, he could still feel the youthful excitement, the adrenaline fueled giddiness of a teenager on the verge of something illicit.

“Why do I get the feeling that you’re here to take me away on a late night illegal expedition?”

Jaehwan half-smiled back at him. “Not illegal. Why must you always assume the worst of me?”

“Because you’re always up to no good, what kind of question is that?” Sanghyuk shot back.

“Fair point,” He twirled his key ring around his finger, the jangle of metal disruptively loud in the night. “I just want to be romantic, for once, take you out on an adventure.” Sanghyuk gave him a disbelieving look. “Also, I couldn’t sleep.”

“I suppose that makes for the two of us then.”

In the yawning dark, the distances seemed to go on forever without the familiarity of landmarks in the morning sun, one mile felt more like ten until the car came to a quiet halt on top of an imperfect, overgrown parking lot. Sanghyuk stepped out into the field, the rustle of grass a soft whisper.

The breeze lightly tousled Jaehwan’s hair as he stepped forward, wordlessly gesturing for Sanghyuk to follow him, and he looked so much younger like this, his face bare and his hair down, dressed down in a T-Shirt and jeans. There was something compelling and something that thumped against Sanghyuk’s chest at an unarmored Jaehwan.

They walked the short distance into the field, armed with the light of a full moon and their phone flashlights cutting through the dark.

It would have been a quiet star dappled night between the two of them, a respite in a hectic world clambering for their attention, if it weren’t for Jaehwan’s tense shoulders and short replies, like he was biting back on words he would regret.

“This is ridiculous, why did you drag me out here if you were in such a pissy mood anyways?” Sanghyuk finally huffed.

Jaehwan looked up from his absent-minded task of ripping little tufts of grass out of the ground and stared at Sanghyuk with an odd mixture of incredulousness and surprise, like he didn’t think that Sanghyuk would notice. “I guess I don’t hide my emotions as well as I think I do.”

“For a supposed hit-man you’re pretty shit at not wearing your emotions on your sleeve.”

An uncomfortable and charged silence fell between them as Jaehwan looked determinedly away.

“I’m angry. But not at you. I wish…” He made a frustrated noise. “I wish I could dream this nightmare away is what I’m saying.”

“Those are strangely poetic words for someone who is mostly sober,” Sanghyuk commented. “Why are you upset? I can’t say that there’s nothing wrong between us, with whatever it is that you might be going through but that doesn’t change the fact that I still think this is one of the best summers someone could ask for.”

Jaehwan laughed, the sound humorless. “Don’t you see that that’s the problem?”

Sanghyuk frowned and he turned to Jaehwan, words of generic reassurance on the tip of his tongue but Jaehwan leaned in and kissed him gentler than he ever had. It was the sweetness of a first kiss stolen behind library shelves, the soft mint on his breath sending a quiet thrill through him.

And Jaehwan took his hand, their fingers interlacing together under the dappled sky, and somehow, somehow this was the most intimate thing they had shared all summer.

—

Nights like this were alive. The Fourth of July was a living, writhing being, dormant in the day with peaceful barbecues and dandelions blown across perfectly manicured green lawns, but it was in the night that roused it from its slumber. In Jaehwan’s corner, the Fourth of July meant heavy bass thudding from expensive speakers, the competitive rumble of street racing, headlights bright enough to blind, the high whine and low growl of fireworks exploding, and the heavy scent of alcohol and youth.

Nights like these sharpened Jaehwan’s smile, and they were dangerous.

He stepped onto the scene well after the sun went down, replaced with showers of fire in the sky. A party like this was always the perfect cover for a murder, a freak accident, a slipped substance. He quickly noted the easiest ways to slip under the cover of the night or into the anonymity of a loud and wasted crowd. Try as he might, the job never slept.

He would meet Sanghyuk here at 11:00. 54 minutes from now his life would crash, an extravagant disaster, and Sanghyuk’s would crumble and slip away. 50 minutes from now Jaehwan would goad Sanghyuk into the race of his life and they would both experience the thrilling high of adrenaline singing in their veins, of broken speed limits and a floored gas pedal. 43 minutes from now Jaehwan would beg one last kiss of Sanghyuk. 30 minutes from now Jaehwan would attempt to drink himself into oblivion because in the end, he was still a coward and not much could change that. 15 minutes from now Jaehwan would meet Sanghyuk for the last time.

42 days ago Jaehwan had met his target properly for the first time under an obnoxiously blue sky, with soda pop in a dusty parking lot.

Han Sanghyuk had been marked for death by his own hand and yet, Jaehwan had played himself. He had fallen in love with a worst case scenario. The movies and the books made it seem so easy to walk away from a job, from a lifestyle, living life while chased by death. They promised that he would be happy as long as he was with someone he loved.

Perhaps it had been fate that was stringing him along this entire time. By fate’s hand was it his destiny to be born into a debt that he could never pay, a life that meant playing the listless role of a puppet or a life spent running from his past. Maybe it was to the amusement of some cruel god that this job fell to him, that he fell in love with the one thing that would kill him. All his life was marked by someone else’s terms, mortal or immortal. He was tired.

He had lived by someone else’s terms, he could live with dying by his own.

He knew that he should revel in this last hour by Sanghyuk’s side but he barely registered anything past the fact that Sanghyuk arrived, with his eyes ablaze with the energy of the night. They laughed and talked a little, Jaehwan’s mind producing only lackluster responses that Sanghyuk assumed was because of alcohol muddling his brain. Jaehwan was sober and Sanghyuk must have known that when he pressed him up against the side of a hundred thousand dollar car, kissing him like he was starved for it, there was not a trace of alcohol on his breath.

Jaehwan’s mind was numb but his heart acted of its own volition, speeding out of control at Sanghyuk’s carefree smile and tousled hair and he wished that he had the strength to burn worlds to keep this all in his life.

The town was alive but the streets were empty, everyone that didn’t have a curfew or a bed time was currently intoxicated on one substance or another, the sky a motley combination of smoke and fireworks. It was a constant shower of light, the normally barren fairgrounds alive with the heartbeat of the constant booms. Alive, alive, Jaehwan felt his chest tightening, the people were celebrating and he felt a million miles away he needed, he needed—

“Jaehwan?” Sanghyuk asked, his voice softer than ever, his hand on Jaehwan’s shoulder.

“I’m fine,” Jaehwan said immediately, his fingers rubbing at his temple, “Headache.” He lied.

“I’m starting to think that you don’t really understand the meaning of ‘I’m fine’.” Sanghyuk’s lips quirked into a little smile, “You’ve been a little out of it. Are you sure you don’t want to just go home?”

He shook his head. “No, I want—“ I want this to last. I want to see you smile, unguarded and brilliant. I want to love you without hating myself every step of the way. I want—

“I want to kiss you,” He said finally. “May I?”

Sanghyuk’s expression was one of confusion, it was nothing special between them to beg a kiss of the other but he nodded anyways.

Jaehwan’s fingers met feverish skin as they traveled lightly up his jawline before tangling softly in his hair and he kissed him softly underneath the chaos of the night. In this moment of respite, it was the quiet before the storm, his body pressed flush against Sanghyuk’s, he could feel the heat of his body where his hand rested on his waist, the little skip of his own heart, he was addicted to this, to him, he felt like he was burning, he felt too much all at once and it was too much. He forced himself to pull away, his eyes guarded, his hands clenched involuntarily into fists by his side before he exhaled unsteadily. He fell apart and put himself back together in less than a second, survival instincts engrained into him that he would never be able to let go of.

He tilted his head slightly, slipping back into the familiarity of an easy smirk. “I think tonight would be wasted without a race. For old times sake?”

Of course Sanghyuk couldn’t refuse a challenge. Not when he had a reputation to uphold amongst his old peers, they walked to their cars amidst catcalls and cheers, a crowd gathering quickly, the air blurred with cigarette smoke.

When Jaehwan got into the driver’s seat, it felt like greeting an old friend, the soft leather welcoming him, the ignition humming in greeting. He rolled his window down when Sanghyuk did.

Their eyes met across the gap of asphalt and there was something charged in the stares that held them.

“See you on the streets,” Sanghyuk said finally, his words cutting through the ruckus of the crowd.

Jaehwan swept in the sight of his youthful intensity, the glow of someone that was happy just to be alive. The spirit of someone who the world would never beat down.

“I’ll see you on the other side.”

Sanghyuk gave him a mock salute and disappeared behind tinted glass.

His fingers tapped a nervous and erratic rhythm on the steering wheel. A flag waved then snapped up into the air. And they were off.

They met each other stride for stride, racing down the straightaway as Jaehwan’s nerves melted into the inky black. They charged into the night, away from the lights. This would be the way the world ends, on his own terms or not at all.

They hurtled through pools of black and pools of light, racing from one streetlight to the next. Jaehwan’s grip on his steering wheel tightened. This was his choice, if he couldn’t reclaim life then he would reclaim his death.

He never registered the loud slam of metal on metal as their cars careened out of control. He had milliseconds for his thoughts to run out of control, to think of Sanghyuk’s fear threatening to overwhelm him, to think of the pain that set his nerves on fire, the sound of the universe crashing in around him.

This is the way the world ends. This is the way the world ends. This is the way the world ends.

Not with a bang but a whimper.

**Author's Note:**

> Heavily inspired by Maggie Stiefvater's The Raven Cycle which you should definitely go read because it's amazing and inspired me so much as an author!!


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